Full Description
Perfect Italian Diction for Singers: An Authoritative Guide provides the steps and tools for singing beautifully and expressively in this language.
Timothy Cheek and Anna Toccafondi systematically home in on the essential features of the most beautiful Italian, pitfalls of non-native singers, and how to overcome those issues. In addition to delving to the heart of Italian sounds and inflection, they present controversies, misconceptions, and various approaches—often conflicting—that have arisen throughout the last century. Chapters also address:
Italian style and legatoBest use of supplemental resources and dictionariesRecitative with suggested, short Mozart excerptsWorking with textSinging diphthongs, triphthongs, and hiatus
Also included are a plethora of audio and video examples and exercises (over seventy QR codes), exercises for group or self-study, and self-assessment summaries. This book will help singers and students lay a solid foundation in beautiful, lyric Italian.
Contents
Recorded Examples and Exercises
Preface
1. The Basis for the Most Beautiful and Correct Lyric Italian Diction
2. The Seven Italian Vowel Sounds
3. The Essentials of Stress and Length
4. The Pronunciation of e and o
5. The Italian Consonants
6. Double Consonants and Phrasal Doublings
7. Legato
8. Mastering Glides, Hiatus, Diphthongs, and Triphthongs
9. Italian Style
10. Working with Text
11. Best Use of Supplemental Resources
12. Recitative
Appendix A. Verb Endings
Appendix B. Essential Grammar
Selected References
Index
About the Authors
